


(the night is long) i feel like i might fade into the dawn

by figueroth (honeyno)



Category: Dimension 20 (Web Series)
Genre: Episode Tag, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, aka yet another take on that missing scene from s02e06, post-Leviathan therapy, probably? attempts at that anyway, this is just a lot of feelings and no attempt at fun tags can fix that, tiny bouncer: the musical
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-28
Updated: 2019-11-28
Packaged: 2021-03-12 03:26:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21598306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/honeyno/pseuds/figueroth
Summary: Riz always has answers , or at least a theory to test, a hypothesis that needs proof but is enough to give him direction.He’s got nothing tonight, just a heavy lungful of ocean air and a misplaced heart, and absolutelynothingto bring to the table.
Relationships: Riz Gukgak/Fabian Aramais Seacaster
Comments: 12
Kudos: 92





	(the night is long) i feel like i might fade into the dawn

**Author's Note:**

> new pseud, who this? or, i caved, finally. i know there have been other excellent takes on basically This Exact Same Scene but i had to get this out of my head. 
> 
> the title is from sam tinnesz's song far from home. 
> 
> this is unbeta-ed because my usual beta reader hasn't seen the episode yet, lol.

Riz doesn’t have any answers and his heart seems to have relocated just half an inch closer to the center of his chest, displaced just enough to be unsettling. It’s a tight, ugly sort of feeling that comes with scanning across the room to take in the crestfallen expressions on the rest of his party without making the effort to really hear any of their hushed non-conversations. 

He grits his teeth and attempts to restrain the sigh that he feels clawing and climbing its way up his lungs until it escapes as a sharp exhale through his nose and makes his shoulders shudder instead. Riz always has _ answers_, or at least a theory to test, a hypothesis that needs proof but is enough to give him direction. 

He’s got nothing tonight, just a heavy lungful of ocean air and a misplaced heart, and absolutely nothing to bring to the table. Riz closes his eyes and presses the heel of his palm to his sternum, rubbing a circle to nudge his racing, spent heart back in its place. It’s beating to the left of where he expects it to be, restrained by anatomy despite its best attempts to be elsewhere. Riz doesn’t know his own body tonight, let alone anything else he could possibly offer as comfort or a lead or— 

“Hey, you okay?” 

He blinks the room back into focus to find Kristen staring at him, brows knit to add a few extra worry lines to her freckled forehead that are just for him. Riz immediately feels guilty to pile more worry onto her plate which runneth over without his own histrionics tonight. His hand drops back down at his side but he doesn’t answer, save for baring some teeth in an expression that really isn’t a smile as he shrugs. Kristen nods. It doesn’t take perfect perception to figure that she feels the exact same way, probably. 

“Well, if you, uh, need anything—” she starts, attempting a non-smile of her own that hurts to watch. 

“I’m gonna go… gonna go to Fabian’s room, I think, actually.” 

Kristen’s face softens and she grants him another nod. Her eyes are unreadable and Riz files the look she gives him away as something to obsess over and unpack when sleep inevitably evades him tonight. He’d be concerned that he can’t follow her thought process if he wasn’t grateful for the distraction. 

Riz doesn’t quite sneak out of the room but he’s good at moving unnoticed and employs that as he departs, followed only by Kristen’s eyes on his way out. He’s just as quiet making his way down to Fabian’s room and when he stands outside the door, hesitating for only a moment before he knocks. 

Unsurprisingly, Fabian doesn’t answer. 

If he were a bit more naïve, Riz would think he might be asleep. If he were a bit more naïve, sleep would seem like a good idea, too. But Riz knows Fabian’s awake on the other side of the door, despite his silence, and stubbornly alone. He knocks again, two quick raps, loud enough to be insistent without stirring the rest of the suite. 

In the next stretched moment of stubborn silence, Riz rests his forehead against the cool, smooth wood of the door and then speaks against it, 

“Don’t make me pick this lock, Fabian, come on.” 

He’s got one hand on the doorknob and the other reaching for the kit at his hip when Fabian relents, 

“It’s not locked, the Ball, come in.” 

Riz feels sheepish as he twists the doorknob and slips into the room, his gaze lowered to where his hand’s hovering within reach of the pouch and just as close to the hilt of his sword. “I don’t know why I just assumed…” 

“What do you want?” 

Fabian isn’t looking at him so Riz doesn’t quite know where to look either as offers, 

“I had to go somewhere quieter, they’re— doing a lot of talking out there.” The lie comes out almost smooth because he’s had a few minutes to rehearse it in his head on his way to the room. “Can I, um, hang out here?” 

Fabian’s eye is still not on him but it does roll in response. It’s a desaturated imitation of what the gesture would be, usually, but he’s still Fabian under the grime of tonight and Riz supposes his face can’t help itself. 

“Please, the Ball. What do you want?” 

“I wasn’t, uh—” It occurs to Riz then that Fabian hasn’t really called out his bullshit so trying to justify it himself would probably incriminate him more, so he reroutes. “I’m— honestly, I just didn’t wanna be out there. A lot’s— you know.” 

He’s not saying much and what he does say comes out just tired where he was aiming for conspiratory. Fabian doesn’t exactly sigh in response but his shoulders drop farther down as he presses his back to the pile of pillows as if he’s trying to disappear through the ornate headboard. He looks smaller like this, small in a way Fabian never is, and Riz can’t look away from him still, the way eyes tend to be drawn to something gruesome and horrible despite better judgement. 

In both cases, for both wounds and Fabian, Riz isn’t equipped to heal, doesn’t even know what would help if he could. His heart and the lump in his throat seem hellbent on merging into something heavy and terrible that’s nesting between his collarbones. 

“I’m just gonna sit, alright?” 

Fabian’s unbearably small shoulders draw up in a half-shrug. 

“You don’t need to do that, you should be with everyone else, I’m fine here,” he says, and it’s the most words he’s said in a long time, and his voice grows tighter around each one until it’s nearly unrecognizable right around _ fine. _

If Riz’s heart wasn’t permanently fused with whatever’s choking him up, it’d probably break. He draws in a breath and stands taller, playing strong as if his shoulders could school Fabian’s back to their usual stance. His hand is at the hilt of his sword again, of its own volition, like he’s got anything to fight in here. 

(The vague notion that he _ might_, that this is an unfamiliar room in a wrecked, unfamiliar city and anything could _be_ here runs like a chill down Riz’s spine and fades into something unnamed and uneasy before his mind can catch up to the thought. He shudders but walks closer to Fabian and his unfamiliar bed anyway.) 

“Look, Fabian, whatever happened tonight—” Fabian shifts then, an almost flinch as he holds a hand out to make Riz stop talking. His brows are drawn together and the quiver in his chin is unbearable. Riz forces himself to watch him still and barrels through, “...I don’t care. I won’t ask or— or anything, I just. I wanna sit with you, Fabian, can I please just _ sit _ here?” 

The hand that was out to shut him up softens and sweeps the air in a small motion Riz is stubborn enough to accept as an invitation. He strides closer and positions himself at the foot of the bed, as relaxed as he can get himself to being with a hand reaching for his sword and a pounding headache that’s replaced where adrenaline had kept him moving earlier. 

“Thanks.” 

Fabian doesn’t respond but his good eye does close and a little tension seems to drain from his face. It’s then that Riz allows himself to appreciate that after and _ despite _everything, Fabian is here and mostly whole and that Riz gets to sit in a room with him and know that the breaking of a dawn somewhere down the line is absolutely inevitable. 

“You should rest,” he says into the silence between them. Fabian says nothing but the rise and fall of his chest has slowed down, like maybe he’s remembering how to breathe easy now, which is all the rest Riz could ask for, really. He’s not even sure if Fabian’s still listening but he adds a promise, “I’ll be here.” 

Then Riz just sits, back against the footboard and perfectly quiet, as the promise of an inevitable dawn eases his heart closer to its rightful place, and draws his eyes shut. 

**Author's Note:**

> oh boi. thanks for reading! do drop a line if you enjoyed. lord knows i've got more feelings where this came from.


End file.
